TABLE 6Linear Regression Results For The Effect Of Expected
Consequences Of Growth On Growth Willingness For The Full Sample.

Full sample n=1158

Full sample withdummies n=1142

Workload

.06*

.06*

Work tasks

.04

.04

Employee well-being

.24***

.24***

Personal income

.10***

.09***

Control

.09**

.09**

Independence

.11***

.11***

Survival of crises

.09**

.08*

Product/service quality

.06

.05

Manufacturing

-.05

Service

.00

5-9 empl

-.05

10-19 empl

-.07*

Old firm

-.07**

Adj. R2

.24

.24

The most important reason for the modest explanatory power
is instead, arguably, that regression coefficients in
cross-section data represent average effects. The true effect for
each individual differs from this average. For some managers
quality is a great concern, whereas for others their own workload
is the top-of-the-mind issue. This fact, i.e., that the
coefficients represent average effects is a general problem and
probably the major reason why explanatory power rarely reaches
much higher values than ours even when seemingly all relevant
variables have been included. The second major reason for this is
that measurement error is always substantial in this kind of
data, because the questions do not have exactly the same meaning
to each respondent and because people differ in their response
styles. We regard our modest explanatory power as a result of
these general problems, rather than the omission of
important explanatory variables.

Admittedly, however, there is one particular weakness
about our measures. We have, in the language of attitude theory,
regarded expected consequences as cognitive responses. This seems
unproblematic. Our classifying the over-all growth willingness
measure as a proxy for behavioural response is more debatable. We
would argue, however, that this is a problem in relation to
psychological theory rather than a problem of questionable logic.
That is, we find it
reasonable to regard expected consequences as causes of
over-all growth willingness as measured. The alternative argument
would hold that over-all growth willingness has an affective
rather than cognitive basis, and that it is this over-all
attitude that determines the evaluations of specific dimensions
such as workload, work tasks, etc. This implies reversed
causality and thus questions our use of the regression model. We
would recommend researchers who would like to pursue the same
theoretical perspective to use as dependent variable a measure
that more clearly reflects goals, plans, or intentions to expand
the firm, realising that finding or creating such a measure is no
easy task